Swerve

… yes, jazz jouissance …

This was a Lancaster-based band I was in for three or four years until the end of 2014. Loved it, actually. Drums-soprano sax-double bass; so, lots of space. Three academics! I started writing for Swerve as well, which was a nice thing to get back to doing—because it was two single-note melody instruments it meant once I had a bass line I liked I just needed a melody. Then let the band find the way the song could work in rehearsals (and drop ones that didn’t seem to work).

Lots more Swerve videos here and music here. We were talking about recording some of our regular gigs at The Robert Gillow to see if we could release some of the live stuff we were working up there in our residency over 18-24 months.

Available for club and pub gigs, benefits for causes we support (ask!), intriguing art/cultural/multi-media events, experiments and improvisations, collaborations, soundtracks, festivals…

Reworked jazz standards from modern backwards, the odd reggae or pop classic, and some originals, given a swerve, a twist, in a sonic exploration of space, vibrato, percussive possibilities, meanders, melodies, intervallic contrast (soprano with bass?), chordless and bible-black. For students and lovers of jazz all around, for those who profess improvisation, for fans of oxymorons: a full sound with an aesthetic of emptiness. Nick says we take jazz standards and empty them out. Tunes everywhere.